Thursday, 14 May 2020

What type of cells does the novel coronavirus attack?

Scientists
from the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH), Charité -- Universitätsmedizin
Berlin and the Thorax Clinic at Heidelberg University Hospital, whose
collaboration is taking place under the auspices of the German Center for Lung
Research (DZL), have examined samples from non-virus infected patients to
determine which cells of the lungs and bronchi are targets for novel
coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) infection. They discovered that the receptor for this
coronavirus is abundantly expressed in certain progenitor cells. These cells
normally develop into respiratory tract cells lined with hair-like projections
called cilia that sweep mucus and bacteria out of the lungs.

The scientists
knew,
from studies by BIH Professor Christian Drosten, director of the Institute of
Virology at Campus Charité; Mitte, and by others, that the virus's spike
protein attaches to an ACE2 receptor on the cell surface. In addition, the
virus needs one or more cofactors for it to be able to penetrate cells. But
which cells are endowed with such receptors and cofactors? Which cells in which
part of the respiratory system are particularly susceptible to SARS-CoV-2
infection? Eils and his colleagues at the BIH and Charité; now used single-cell
sequencing technology to examine the cells in the samples from Heidelberg.

60,000
single cells were sequenced

The
researchers discovered that certain progenitor cells in the bronchi are mainly
responsible for producing the coronavirus receptors. These progenitor cells
normally develop into respiratory tract cells lined with hair-like projections
called cilia that sweep mucus and bacteria out of the lungs.